Chinese Badminton

Like I've said LYB has sort of become a changed man after CHN's London Olympic clean sweep - it's as if he has reached the pinnacle of his career achievement of a lifetime and he is now at the stage of self-actualization according to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

Even when Du Pengyu first made known his intention to retire to LYB long before the Thomas Cup debacle, LYB didn't approve it and then when DuPY unexpectedly won the BAC'13 title partly owing to Chen Long's injury in the semifinal with Wang ZM, he felt heartened enough and encouraged to carry on but,unfortunately, later came the Thomas Cup downfall which hurt him real bad. Once again DuPY approached LYB for permission to quit but LYB replied that he would think about it, evidently still reluctant to let him go; however, this time DuPY didn't wait for LYB's answer and took matters in his own hand to announce his final decision, insisting he wanted out and returned to his hometown, based on a report I read.

You know, when LYB was criticised for the WD embarrassment at the Incheon AG where CHN was without any WD representative before the individual WD Final, he actually gave the excuse that being indisputably superior does not equate to invincibility, making no apologies for the failure save some regret.

When LXR for the second successive year stumbled at the final hurdle of the WC - for the Copenhagen WC incident, LYB merely said LXR was too tensed and couldn't play well - he not only didn't blame her but continued urging her to believe in herself especially during the Incheon AG for which LXR has expressed her gratitude and appreciation to Chen Jin and Zhang Ning as well. Enough said, all the above are just my opinions based on what I've read from the Chinese newsmedia.

 

Wonder when Tian Houwei will finally make a real breakthrough in his badminton career.

Wang Zhengming as we know is already long overdue except that, unlike DuPY, he is not giving up and still want to strive for the Rio Olympics despite knowing full well there are only two spots available and both Lin Dan and Chen Long are set on going. I'm not sure if I should admire his determination but I do support his decision to carry on and go for it.

Talking about the Olympics, LYB the other week was saying that due to the new quota ruling of maximum two qualification spots per nation for each discipline, it will be extremely difficult for CHN to repeat the London Olympics unprecedented success of five golds and cautioned that it's not impossible for CHN to end up with not a single gold.

 

Suddenly thought of Liu Kai, remember him? The young man who impressed at the last CHN Open GPG and the BAC. Haven't heard anything of him for quite some time and didn't see his name registered for the Bitburger GPG where incidentally juniors like Liao Junwei, YOG Champ Shi Yuqi and WJ Champ Lin Guipu are listed.

 

In former times, LYB would have sidelined LXL/QZH or split them up or relegate them to the 2nd team (or worse still kicked them out of the national team altogether). Now he's willing to continue giving them chances to prove themselves.

On CHN MD, LYB is of the view that MD was never really CHN's strength for a considerable long time (I'd say since he took office as Head Coach in 1993), it just so happened that CHN was very fortunate to have two such outstanding men's doubles players in Cai Yun and Fu Haifeng to deliver the goods at team championships for several years, apart from these two there is virtually no one else in fact.

 

Heartwarming to know Wang Zhengming still has a small group of die-hard fans. In that WC'13 Simulation Match, even WZM himself was surprised at beating Lin Dan but,iirc, Xia XZ wasn't too impressed saying Lin Dan wasn't fully into the match and made more than his fair share of errors, uncharacteristically.

Your pt 2 suggesting WZM to take up XD is quite interesting, replacing Xu Chen who is not expected to last until Rio'16 which means Ma Jin needs a new partner asap. Sounds a good idea to me.

I too had thought Liu Cheng/Kang Jun is a good prospect but at the Copenhagen WC they were bundled out by a JPN pair in R1, so I put my hopes in them on hold for the time being - my best memory of them remains how they once pushed Ahsan/Setiawan hard in a close three-setter.

Well, 2013 was a bad year for Team CHN in LYB's eyes, who would have expected 2014 to be worse, CHN losing two major team titles in one year is almost unheard of in recent times. Let's see how CHN fare come 2015 with the Sudirman Cup on homesoil and the WC as well as the various Superseries.

 

Maybe, but at least he disposed of Kento Momota in two straight sets at the BAC'14 and the refreshing part, to me, is how he smashed the daylights out of every single one of his opponents, including Lin Dan who was sent sprawling or caught flat-footed, no mean feat that was.

 

Yeah, high time for LYB to get really serious and come down to brass tacks with stronger sense of urgency.

I say, the rest of the world had better not hope for LYB to step down or be replaced at this time. Just imagine, whoever takes over him would most certainly find LYB a hard act to follow and, in order to prove himself worthy of the position of CBA's newly-appointed Head Coach, may go to great lengths and take drastic measures to not only set things right but also achieve awe-inspiring results, then for all you know Chinese badminton might truly become dominant one day to the dismay of the ROW.